Cleaning and sanitizing

Northern Brewer General
1

Greetings,

I am curious if anyone has a particular cleaning and sanitizing protocol that they find to work really well. I am living in an apartment that has some mold issues and I have found I need to take cleaning and sanitizing to a whole new level due to the environment.

I am just looking for new ideas and tricks.

Best,
RH

2

I clean with either PBW or Oxyclean, and use StarSan for sanitizing. Never had a problem that way.

Paul

3

I’ll second PBW. I just started using it actually and it is awesome. If you have some serious mold issues or just a nasty environment in general I would clean carboys and then make sure to seal them with tinfoil or an airlock just to keep the nasties out. As far as sanitizing I just bought a thing of starsan to try out because everyone raves about it but we’ve been using onestep with no problems I can think about. Just follow the proper mixing rates and contact times.

4

[quote=“paultuttle”]I clean with either PBW or Oxyclean, and use StarSan for sanitizing. Never had a problem that way.

Paul[/quote]

+1 ^^^

On brew / bottling / kegging days I keep a bucket with Starsan around for quick rinsing and sanitizing. Everything gets dunk in the bucket or gets wiped down with a paper towel soaked in starsan.

5

PBW is amazing. I have also been using starsan (don’t fear the foam).

How about tips on sanitizing the bottles. I have been using a sanitized funnel to fill with solution, then shake and dump…

6

I fill up a large tub with starsan/water solution and fill the bottles by submerging them – this is a fun way for my 5 year-old son to “help” with the process. Then I dump the solution back in the tub and give the bottles a quick hot rinse.

Then save most of the solution for next time in a few home depot buckets with lids.

7

[quote=“HaleBrewer”]I fill up a large tub with starsan/water solution and fill the bottles by submerging them – this is a fun way for my 5 year-old son to “help” with the process. Then I dump the solution back in the tub and give the bottles a quick hot rinse.

Then save most of the solution for next time in a few home depot buckets with lids.[/quote]

Don’t rinse starsan. You’re undoing the sanitizing when you do.

8

I tend not to remove labels. Mostly because it becomes a massive pain in the butt. Is it ok to soke the bottles then? Or should I continue what I’m doing?

9

If, like many of us, you submerge the bottles in a sanitizing solutiion prior to filling, you might want to remove the labels just to prevent the posibility of glue disolving and getting into your otherwise well crafted beer.
:cheers:

10

Get one of those little bottle brushes for cleaning bottles. I have a couple of buckets I like to fill with sanitizer. I clean each bottle with hot water and the brush and then put them in the bucket of sanitizer until I’m ready to bottle. Then I just take them out one at a time and fill.

I haven’t had to de-label anything in a while but I’ve heard people say that PBW is great for that too. Let em soak over night and then wipe them off pretty much.

11

PBW works great for getting labels off. I just soak’em for about 10min in hot water/pbw solution. The label comes off pretty easily. I use a potato scrubber (little brush with strong bristles) to clean the glue off. And then rinse them out real well. I’ll use a bottle brush the first time I clean a bottle, but never again after that. I pour my beer into a glass and rinse them out immediately with hot water. Then they go in an empty case until I’m ready to fill them again. Then I just rinse with starsan before they get filled again. They only time a scrub a bottle a second time is if I see some sort of build up or if the bottles sit without being rinsed… like if I take a case to a BBQ or something and people drink from the bottle and let them sit without a good rinse.

12

dobe…I should have been more clear. I don’t rinse the inside, just the outside (upside down under the hot water) for a second to kill the slipperiness.